While a $23 million homeless assistance program might face a $189,000 reduction during an economic recession, only $58,000 was squeezed from $5.8 million in expense accounts for state Senate and House members in the proposed 2010-11 budget.

While 600 libraries statewide will likely be forced to swallow a $5.5 million reduction in a $60 million state subsidy for operations, the $20.7 million in state House "special leadership accounts" will have to deal with $206,000 less in funding.

And while there will be $500,000 less in emergency mortgage assistance for people who have lost their jobs - at a time when the state unemployment rate is 9.1 percent and the local unemployment rate is 10.3 percent - the General Assembly reduced its $10.8 million budget for "incident expenses" by only $109,000.

Overall, the budget to operate the General Assembly increased by $1.3 million, from $299 million to $300.3 million.

Among other reforms, the grand jury said the Legislature should:— Eliminate, or at least make more transparent, the special leadership accounts that give House leaders millions of dollars in discretionary spending to control.

About Me

McGruff the crime dog is a collaborated effort of artists, producers, writers, etc. Likewise this blog is a joint effort of concerned persons who are interested in politics and ending the efforts of politicians who derive private gain from their office; Politicians who thumbe their those at their constituency because they feel the power of incumbency allows them to be arrogant to the voters; Politicians who outright lie to the voters.
Posts will contain links so the readers can see for themselves what the real facts are on an issue.
People try to guess who the authors are on this blog. A friendly hint, they are never the same people. Being factual takes a joint effort to garner information. So the composition of an article will be gleaned from various sources, usually never the same.